JeremyKolb.com

May 6, 2015

Ok, how many of you saw this video of a toddler shooting
hoops? His father made a highlight video and it went truly viral on YouTube,
over 30 million combined between the first video and the follow up. The toddler
became famous, got the chance to beat Channing Tatum and Bradley Cooper in a
shootout, and even got to show off a bit during the halftime of a college
basketball game. Or how about ‘kickalicious’? a Norwegian placekicker who made
a highlight reel kicking footballs and ended up on the Detroit Lions?

These guys created remarkable videos, ones people couldn’t
help but comment on and share. In return they got some awesome opportunities
and a good bit of cash.

Being Remarkable

All the viral videos you’ve seen have one thing in common:
they make you want to tell your friends about it. Whether they make you
want to tell them how cool it is or how stupid, they make you want to say
something about them; in a word they are remarkable.

You can’t overemphasize the importance of our shift towards
an attention economy. A new type of asset in this world is remarkability and
I’m going back to the traditional definition with this. A remarkable thing is
anything that causes people to say something about it. Whether in agreement or
disagreement, anything that is unique enough to make people want to respond to
it is remarkable.

One of the easiest marketing errors to fall into is being
boring. A lot of marketing is boring, and the cool thing about that is it opens
the door for us. If you can be remarkable, then you can drive traffic and
sales.

If you understand how to make stuff that gets people talking it can
go viral. There is a lot to learn about creating content that can get people’s
attention, and marketers all have their different strategies for capturing this
elusive goal.

Now
you might be thinking, “yeah this is all great, but I’m not marketing a kid who
can do trick shots or some other viral sensation.” and you’re right. But the
good news is you’re not looking to sell to Bradley Cooper or the Detroit Lions,
you’re stuff doesn’t need to be remarkable to them, it needs to be remarkable
to your customers.Originally shared on Linkedin

July 10, 2014

For entrepreneurs and small business owners looking to get the most out of their social media, Social Media Marketing that Works is a different kind of marketing book that helps you learn how to find leads online and convert them into customers. It isn't just about one trick and it doesn't just tell you about the social networks. This book starts by helping you identify how you can use social media, it helps you discover who your potential customers are and where they are online, and it covers the tricks every marketing person should know.

There is a fundamental disconnect between the way traditional marketing works and how modern consumers engage with companies and products. As a result people are spending their budgets on marketing practices with a declining return on investment, and when we most need our marketing to come through it simply fails to deliver.

You need to understand why traditional marketing is producing fewer results and how social media marketing can work for you. This book teaches you what to expect from social media marketing and how to do it well.

With companies like Audible, Zappos, and Groupon, more purchases are made online for more types of products than ever before; we are entering an era where any type of transaction can start online. Add to that the advances in the technology behind social media marketing, the tools that help you do it more easily and the ones helping you track your results, and you can see how social media marketing is a good investment. The primary reason we need to focus on social media marketing is the economic shift that has taken place, a shift to an attention driven economy.

In 2012 Steve Gadlin founded a company called 'I want to draw a cat for you' and appeared on Shark Tank, an ABC show where entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to venture capitalists. Gadlin told them what his business was and they laughed, he sang a song and they laughed, he danced and they laughed, and everything about it screamed this is stupid flop of a business that shouldn't get funding. But Gadlin got the funding he asked for and the question we should be asking is why. He isn't a great artist or a great business man, his song was just ok and his dancing was silly, but one thing Gadlin does remarkably well is grab your attention; and in today's economy attention is among the scarcest of resources.

Social Media Marketing that Works is currently free, grab your copy today to improve on what you're currently doing or launch your social campaign as effectively as possible.

June 27, 2014

Typically when I tell someone I’m the founder of National
Onion Ring Day they’re pretty indifferent about it, but the strangest thing
happened to me this past June 22nd. Instead of the typical response, my friend was incredulous: “Is this TRUE? I need PROOF!”

So I did a little digging and it turns out that the holiday
I set up for kicks and giggles 8 years ago is now kind of a thing; it has an
established hashtag on twitter, and once a year it is more popular than ‘running through
the woods’ and ‘pickled pig feet’. It’s only been a thing for three yours now,
and we’ll call that exhibit
A. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s talk about the history and origin
of National Onion Ring Day.

Many years ago a younger and somewhat sillier version of me had a
crush on a girl I worked with at a one week camp for the mentally and
physically handicapped. It was the final day and as fate would have it onion
rings were being served in the cafeteria. I pocketed the smallest one I could find and later proposed
with the somewhat beat-up yet still remarkably greasy onion ring. It was
decided then and there that we would get married on National Onion Ring Day.

Now this was the year before Steve Jobs revolutionized society with the launch of the iPhone, so I headed home from camp looking forward to discovering the date for my onion ring wedding. But when I got home and searched Google the humble onion ring had
no holiday. Unperturbed I set out to
right this injustice. I used what little I knew of the internet to found
National Onion Ring Day on June 22… because June is great and I liked the number
22. The National Onion Ring Day Association was founded, and that along with a no longer existing wiki article are the humble beginnings
of National Onion Ring Day.

That's the story and here is the evidence:

According to the internet there is a general consensus that National Onion Ring Day is June 22. The proposal and setting of the date as June 22 happened in 2006, this is confirmed by the National Onion Ring Day Association Google Group page, which we will call Exhibit
B. In Exhibit A we see that National Onion Ring Day didn't have much if any popularity prior to 2011 and since I established the date in 2006 it seems logical that it's founding has its origins in that crush I had 8 years ago.

This is the first time I've done much of anything involving National Onion Ring Day since its founding (the only thing I did was put it on my Amazon Author page). The fact that people know it and celebrate it speaks to one of the truths of the internet: what you create online can have a life of its own.

Jeremy Kolb

Author, teacher, and head of experimental marketing at RainFactory.

Marketing is simply fascinating; it's where psychology and business intersect, and the principles you learn from books and classes are put to the test. As head of experimental marketing, I watch the latest societal, economic, and technological trends to find new and more effective means of marketing products and services.

There is a fundamental disconnect between the way traditional marketing works and how modern consumers engage with companies and products. As a result, business’ are spending their budgets on marketing practices with a declining return on investment, and when we most need our marketing to come through, it simply fails to deliver.

You need to understand why this traditional marketing is producing fewer results and how social media marketing can work for you. This book teaches you what to expect from social media marketing and how to do it well: